The guardians of the temple met to choose a successor, and, naturally desirous that the sanctity of the oracle should suffer no abatement, elected a young priest of goodly presence and ascetic life; the humblest, purest, most fervent, and most ingenuous of the sons of men.

On which side may palliation be pleaded, and which party may most reasonably claim an abatement of the rigors of law?

The amnesty granted to some pirates, the hanging of others, and the new Act of Parliament, caused a great abatement of the evil.

Throughout July the excessive heat of the weather underwent no abatement, but in place of the clear atmosphere that had prevailed during the preceding month, unwholesome blights filled the air, and, confining the pestilential effluvia, spread the contagion far and wide with extraordinary rapidity.

Daybreak brought with it no abatement of the storm, but presented to my view a wide vista of white foaming surge as far as the eye could reach.

He would have been quite content with preaching simple homely sermons on the obvious but hard duties of daily life, and not seeing much come of them; with finding a slow abatement of the self-indulgent habits of university life, with keeping Fridays, with less wine in common room.

It is true that everybody has seen the same thing one hundred and fifty times, but this description of indulgence appears to grow by what it feeds upon, and the fascinated victim watches the operation of the workers with a gratification which knows no abatement.

During the reign of his father in 1254, accompanied by his wife and child, he travelled to the court of Mangu-khan, the great sovereign of the Tartars or Mongals, for the purpose of obtaining an abatement of the tribute which had been imposed by these conquerors upon his country, and appears to have been successful in his negotiations.

" These popular estimates, may serve the purpose of general comparison, but require some considerable abatements.

We are taxed twice as much by our IDLENESS, three times as much by our PRIDE, and four times as much by our FOLLY: and from these taxes, the Commissioners cannot ease, or deliver us by allowing an abatement.

A certain portion of the monied class would be obliged either to sacrifice their predilections by engaging in business, or to lend on inferior security; and they would accordingly accept, where they could obtain good security, an abatement of interest equivalent to the difference of risk.

Nor will you, I feel confident, permit any abatement of the principal of the legacy to be made should it turn out that the stocks in which the investments have been made have undergone a depreciation.

She was no sooner informed that they were Swedish prisoners, than her soul shuddered at the thoughts of the Russian barbarity; and not doubting but their usage during life had been of a piece with that after their death, she resolved, if possible, to procure some abatement of the miseries of those who yet survived.

"' 'In the latter part of his life, in order to satisfy himself whether his mental faculties were impaired, he resolved that he would try to learn a new language, and fixed upon the Low Dutch, for that purpose, and this he continued till he had read about one half of Thomas à Kempis; and finding that there appeared no abatement of his power of acquisition, he then desisted, as thinking the experiment had been duly tried.

He slapped the wet sand at the creeping fire, and wherever it struck there seemed to come a quick abatement of the conflagration.

" I mention this, that the whole matter may be seen just as it was, and that other Christians may not be discouraged if they feel some abatement of that fervour, and of those holy joys which they may have experienced during some of the first months or years of their spiritual life.